Benefits and Side Effects of Food Additives

Food additives are substances added to manufactured foods and beverages with the aim of prolonging their shelf life. Some additives are also used to boost the flavor of these foods with the aim of making them more appealing to the consumers. In this regard, food additives have an effect of bringing a desirable effect on the foods for the manufacturers. However, this might not be the case to the consumers because the additives have been shown to have some side effects to the users. The following study identifies the origin, benefits, and demerits of using food additives on the health of the users.

The Origin of Food Additives

Food additives were there from ancient days. In the olden days, the additives were mainly obtained from natural sources such as from dates and pepper crops. Some used salt to preserve the foods while others used the sun to preserve through drying. The modern day preservatives are manufactured in the laboratories and have an artificial nature. The nature of this kind of additives is that they have the ability to keep foods safe for consumption for a longer time than the natural ones. The advantages and disadvantages of additives are done here since the natural ones have little demerits.

Advantages of food additives

Food additives prolong the shelf life of food substances. This is good for business, as the food will not go bad while being sold. The other advantage is that the additives can be used to improve the taste of the foods. Salt is one of the additives used to make enhance the taste of many foods. Salt also makes food better in terms of lifespan and appearance. This is important in securing the life of the foods especially by making them appealing in texture (Smith, 2011). Food colors are also other additives that are used to in the industry. They are meant to be used for improving the appearance of foods. This is for purposes of making the food more appealing for consumption. This also has the benefit of making consumers appreciate the food better as well as making them better for human consumption. The other advantage that this will bring is that it makes foods have a better taste than before. Additives have also gained popularity because they have a nutritional effect. They are known to have beneficial nutrients such as vitamins A, B and D. As well as Niacin and Riboflavin, which have benefits to the human body.

Disadvantages of additives

Despite the benefits that additives have, there are demerits that come with it. For instance, butylated hydroxyanisole also referred to as BHA has been known to be a potential carcinogen. This potential poison can destroy the human life. It is for this reason that the medics are against the use of such chemicals in food (Passos, 2010). All manufactured additives have this chemical among other potentially harmful chemicals. This makes it a harmful to use much of these additives on food.